


The Ghost Child

by Pauliestorylover



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Child Danny, Danny has amnesia, Except they don't know they're siblings, Gen, Jazz is traumatized, Sibling Bonding, The Fentons' A+ Parenting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-14 23:34:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28928856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pauliestorylover/pseuds/Pauliestorylover
Summary: Danny was seven when he stepped into his parents’ portal. He was seven when he died. He was seven when he was half brought back to life, no longer in the basement lab.Three years later, the Fentons built another portal. A ghost child returned to a home he no longer remembered.
Relationships: Danny Fenton & Ghosts, Danny Fenton & Jazz Fenton
Comments: 3
Kudos: 52





	1. Death

“I don’t know, Danny,” Jazz reasoned, “This is dangerous.”

Danny grinned impishly as he tugged his brand new HAZMAT suit down from the hanger. It was galaxy-themed and unusually stylish for a Fenton product; a gift for his seventh birthday. Jazz wished her suit was half as pretty.

They were down in their parents’ lab to look at the latest invention: a portal that supposedly led to the Ghost Zone. Jazz scoffed internally even as she thought of it; everyone knew ghosts did not exist. _Of course_ the portal wouldn’t work. How could it lead to a world that didn’t even exist?

Unfortunately, Danny—being naïve and kind of an idiot—was enthused by the idea of a ghost portal. That was why they were in the labs, _where they shouldn’t be_ , instead of upstairs doing stuff kids with _normal parents_ did on Saturday afternoons.

“Jazz, don’t be a worrywart.” Danny pouted. “I’m just taking a look! The portal doesn’t even work, it’s not like it can hurt me. And I’ll be wearing my suit. I’ll be fine. Pinkie promise.”

Jazz scowled, “You know we’re not even allowed down here without supervision until we’re twelve. We should get back upstairs before mum and dad come home.” This was stupid. She shouldn’t have let Danny talk her into coming down to the labs while their parents were out. “We’re gonna be grounded.”

Danny pouted, “Stop being a spoilsport, Jazz! Just one peek and we’ll go back upstairs!” He edged towards the portal. “Don’t you think it is really cool that another _world_ lies on the other sides of the portal?”

Jazz didn’t think it was cool, mostly because said world _did not exist_ , but she didn’t get a chance to tell Danny that before he stepped into the portal. “Danny, _don’t_ —“

_Too late._ Danny turned around to grin at Jazz, but stumbled. He yelped and put his hand on the wall to steady himself.

A jet of sickly green shot out from the end of the portal.

_“Danny!”_

Jazz tried to force her body to move, to close the portal, to pull Danny from the portal, to do _anything,_ but she was frozen.

She could only watch as her brother’s small form was consumed by the flood of toxic green.

The portal became filled with ectoplasm. Jazz let her eyes roam over the circular doorway, but there was no sign of Danny.

Then, the portal exploded.

Jazz screamed. She closed her eyes and covered her head with her arms. Shrapnel sliced against her flesh. Something warm and wet soaked through her clothes. Icy and thick ectoplasm landed onto her cuts.

Jazz did not care.

Her brother was dead.

Her brother was dead and it was all her fault. 

When Jazz reopened her eyes, the portal had been blown into fragments. The lab was covered in ectoplasm. Pieces of metal were embedded into the walls.

And all that was left of her brother was ashes.

* * *

In the Ghost Zone, a pair of bright green eyes opened.


	2. Again

Jazz stormed into her room and slammed her door shut. She screamed into her pillow. It was very cathartic. 

She couldn’t believe her parents were activating _another_ portal.

After Danny’s…accident, they had sworn off inventing ghost weaponry. It didn’t last, of course. Because their son _dying_ meant less than _inventing things that_ _didn’t work_ to fight _creatures that didn’t exist_.

And now they were about to activate another portal, _on the third anniversary of Danny’s death_.

It felt like spitting in the face of Danny’s death.

Jazz hated her parents. They were the ones who should’ve died, not Danny.

(She pointedly did not think about how Danny would be ten by now, if he had lived; or how he would still be alive, if she had pushed harder and stopped him from going into the portal. She pointedly did not think about how she was just as guilty as her parents.)

(Rage was easier to deal with than grief or guilt.)

“Someday, Bearbert,” Jazz told her teddy bear, “I’ll be old enough to move out. I’ll go to a college so far away that no one there has even heard of Amity Park, and I’ll never have to even _think_ about my stupid parents again. _Someday._ ”

* * *

The first time Maddie built a portal to the Ghost Zone, she found an error in Jack’s equations at the last second. Vlad ended up with a faceful of ectoplasm, a bad case of ectoacne and thirteen weeks in quarantine.

The second time, there was an error in the wiring. She and Jack had taken a trip out of the house to clear their heads and look at the problem in a new perspective. When they returned, the portal had exploded, with their son in it. 

Anyone else might have taken that as a sign to stop, but not the Fentons. Not Maddie.

The third time, the portal finally activated without a glitch.

Maddie smiled as she caught her first glimpse of the parallel dimension. Fortune favoured the persistent.

* * *

Danny Phantom had always been curious. Spectra said it was one of his Obsessions, along with helping people.

(Spectra was a fruitloop. He did not care what she said.)

The point being, when the blobs told him about a portal that did not close despite it being two weeks already, Danny had to check it out.

With Blobera on his right shoulder, Blobbington on his left one and Just Blob in his arms, Danny floated into the portal. He exited into a metal room, with strange things and containers of ectoplasm lying all over the place.

Danny grinned; he would have fun exploring this weird, interesting place. 


End file.
